The SA Friends of the Beit Halochem Zahal Disabled Veterans Organisation was established in Johannesburg in 1982, its primary goal being to help and support Zahal disabled veterans by raising funds to help them return and resume their normal lives as soon as possible.

Generous Killarney Mall shoppers and retail sponsors have managed to collect one-years-worth of stationery for Thembelenkosini Care Givers in Soweto, part of an ongoing initiative to support the centre.

There’s a popular weekly satirical show in Israel called Eretz Nehederet. In a recent episode, an actor playing Benny Gantz, the former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) and newcomer to Israeli politics, is asked how he’s feeling.

Devotion to the cause of the State of Israel flourishes in the most unlikely places, even in societies where the Jewish presence is small to non-existent. Such is the case in Mozambique, where the work of Beth-El Associacao Crista Amigos De Israel - Mozambican Christian Friends of Israel - testifies to how much can be achieved by those inspired by their Christian faith to promote the Israeli cause, despite adverse conditions.

JNF’s unique “Blue Boy Box” now lives at King David Linksfield Pre-Primary so that children of each generation learn the importance of tzedakah (charity or welfare). It is the responsibility of Jews all over the world to build Israel, develop it and nurture it as the home of the Jewish nation

“Knowledge is Light” was our school motto when I was a child in Durban. The importance of education was made clear to us from as far back as I can remember. It wasn’t taken for granted. A good education was a privilege.

How to fight terrorism while at the same time not encourage it is a challenge Israel continues to grapple with. Last Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that he was enacting the so-called “terrorist salaries law” for the first time. It allows Jerusalem to deduct from the monthly taxes it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) those monies it claims go towards terrorism.

(JTA) After the New England Patriots beat the favoured Kansas City Chiefs to reach their third straight Super Bowl – their amazing ninth in less than 20 years – CBS sports analyst Boomer Esiason made an intriguing statement, namely that Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman belongs in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

I can’t bear bullies! I know I am not alone in having a serious aversion to anyone or any group who tries to make themselves feel better by making others feel bad about themselves. I can’t stand people who push others around just because they are not able – for whatever reason – to stand up to them.

We have all heard the term before, and either flinched, cringed, or nodded our heads. The words “apartheid Israel” have become a term so often used in the discourse around Israeli-Palestinian conflict that we have somewhat lost our ability to think critically about its use.

With Prince William’s historic visit to Israel this week, all eyes have been trained on the Jewish capital. It may have taken 70 years, but the first official visit by a member of the British Royal family began in Israel on Monday, when William, the Duke of Cambridge, arrived in Tel Aviv.

Some 5 600 emissaries (shluchim) from Chabad-Lubavitch from all over the world gathered at the Pier 8 warehouse in Brooklyn, New York this week for the opening of their four-day annual international conference and banquet, 75 years after the arrival of the Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, from Europe.

It boggles the mind. Why is so much Torah-coverage given to the subject of an elaborate tent-structure called the tabernacle? The verses that relate to the tabernacle’s construction seem to go on and on. They fill not one, but four weekly portions.

“The greatness of our nation is that our people are great. We are a nation of heroes, of people with good and decent moral fibre who will not tolerate our country being plundered!” So said Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein in Pretoria this morning.“This is a struggle for accountability and justice,” Goldstein told the crowd (which included prominent Jewish CEOs like Adrian Gore, Stephen Koseff and Michael Katz). “This struggle is about sovereignty. The power of the people always triumphs in the end.”

“Minutes before the Hawks came looking”

EXCLUSIVE: First Video of Rabbi Berland meeting with his students in Johannesburg on Thursday 17 April. Rabbi Eliezer Berland’s followers have sent this video to SA Jewish Report Online saying it was taken just before a Hawks raid. What do the Hawks say…?

by
ANT KATZ | Apr 30, 2014

This short video was sent to SAJR Online by followers. They say that the Rabbi and the group are singing the verse "Bring us to Zion your city with song, to Jerusalem Your Holy Temple with eternal joy."

The video was provided by one of Rabbi Berland’s senior students, Yossi, who told SAJR Online that “This verse has become a common prayer for Rabbi Berland and his followers who wish to see their Rabbi back in Israel teaching Torah.”

An EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW with Yossi was published on SAJR Online earlier this week putting the position of rabbi Berland and his followers.

In a note accompanying this video today, Yossi told SAJR that Rav Berland’s followers “say that they are victims of a conspiracy in Israel to get their Rabbi to stop teaching Torah and inspiring secular Israelis to become religious.”

Yossi says that “minutes after the video ends, the Hawks arrive looking for the Rabbi. The followers are sure they were hired by the same thugs who began their efforts to stop the Rabbi from teaching in Israel, continued in Morocco and Zimbabwe with bribes to the Government and police force, and are continuing now in Johannesburg. These thugs,” says Yossi, are “former students of the Rabbi, try using Government and media as a means to stop the Rabbi wherever he may go.”

Asked for comment today, Chief Rabbi Dr warren Goldstein told SAJR Online that he does not have any further comment at this stage

SAJR Online has spoken to Hawks spokesman Captain Paul Ramaloka twice and corresponded four times over the past week. While Ramaloka confirmed the Hawks had been involved in some activity but he has not sent SAJR details despite several undertakings to do so

1 Comment

1
Mam Mosselson
01 May

This is not an impossible dream by the rabbi- he can go back to Jerusalem at any time he chooses. In fact the Israeli police would only be too happy to welcome him. The fact that he is not there is surely only due to his own culpability.
Please let him return as soon as possible.